


Lush

by ghostwriterly



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Domestic Fluff, Fluff, Keith is beautiful, Lush bathbombs have a cameo, M/M, Romance, Romantic Fluff, Shiro is an organic farmer, Shiro pines, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, also kittens, matchmaker cats
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-26
Updated: 2018-08-26
Packaged: 2019-07-02 21:15:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,369
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15804720
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ghostwriterly/pseuds/ghostwriterly
Summary: Sometimes you find love in a basket of bath bombs--sometimes you find it in a box of kittens.{A Shiro/Keith AU}





	Lush

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lemonsorbae](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lemonsorbae/gifts).



> This bath bomb and kitten drenched silliness is courtesy of many a late night chat with my favorite, whose birthday is TODAY. HAPPY BIRTHDAY [lemonsorbae](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lemonsorbae) ILU.

“Shiro, for the love of all that’s holy can you _please_ go wait on that idiot.”

From the front of the store came the distinct sound of a display being toppled, all of Shiro’s carefully placed bath bombs tumbling to the floor.

He sighed heavily. “I hate college kids.”

Pidge snorted, pushing him toward the door. “Yeah, okay buddy. I’ll remind you of that next time you’re boinking one.”

“I don’t _boink,_ ” Shiro grumbled, cheeks heating. “I do have standards.” He scowled at the dark heads scrambling around his sales floor, trying to gather up the sparkling pink and turquoise glitter bombs that had scattered when one of them had tipped over their basket. “Can I help you?” He cleared his throat when neither responded. “Hello?”

The one in the leather jacket froze, sitting back on his heels and exhaling. Shiro could just make out the ferocious scowl he threw at his companion before he slid gracefully to his feet and turned.

And _oh. Oh sweet Jesus._

He was…

Taller than he had first appeared, and older, all lanky, sinuous muscle, and too long hair, and gorgeous violet eyes, and _Christ,_ were his eyelashes even real?

He was fucking beautiful and Shiro forgot about the bath bombs. He forgot his own name. He swallowed, trying to find his tongue.

“Man, I’m so sorry. We’ll clean it up.”

Shiro blinked. The ethereal creature was _speaking to him_ and his voice was ice-covered tree limbs on a cold winter morning, husky and bright, the tones as clear as bells on the wind. “It’s fine,” Shiro managed to murmur, willing himself to take a step closer. For a split second, he was afraid--afraid to break the cocoon of silence that had sprung up around them, even the dust motes seemingly frozen in the air.

The handsome dark head tilted in question, those pretty eyes narrowing. “Are you okay?”

Shiro mentally shook himself. _Yeah. Yes. I’m fine. I’m amazing. You’re gorgeous and perfect. Will you marry me?_ But when he opened his mouth what came out was, “Welcome to Lush.”

…

“And you didn’t even get his number? I’m both disappointed and amazed. The great Takashi Shirogane. Felled at last.” Pidge was wiping her eyes, laughter still bubbling in her voice.

“Shut up,” Shiro groaned, eyes tightly closed behind his fists. “What if he never comes back? What if I never see him again? I’m supposed to _marry him!_ ”

He started when a cool hand grazed the back of his neck. _Allura._

“I think it best if you have a conversation consisting of more than three words before you propose, Shiro,” Allura said, not unkindly. She patted his shoulder before she stood. They had been commiserating with Shiro around the breakroom table, but there were shelves to stock and customers to tend. “And if it is meant to be, he’ll come back.”

Shiro groaned again. Allura and her unflagging belief in the powers of the universe. “I’m doomed.”

The universe had never been on Shiro’s side.

Orphaned at twelve, he had spent his formative years in and out of the foster system, leaving for basic training the day after he graduated from high school. The Air Force had been good for him, but the helicopter crash that had taken his right arm had also taken his career, and while the GI Bill paid for his degree, it didn’t pay the rent when he found himself pursuing a master’s in botany. Neither did running his little organic farm just outside the city--which is how he found himself part-timing it three nights a week and every other Saturday at Lush.

It had been tough, at first, looking for work he could believe in, finding a company with a philosophy close to his own and hours that didn’t compete with the farm. And while Lush wasn’t perfect (his real dream was to open his own botanicals shop one day, using products created from his own harvest), the job had provided him with a stable second income and a new set of friends. Friendship and companionship was something that had been sorely missing from his life since he had bought the farm with his _sorry about your arm_ severance check from the military. He hadn’t known how much he needed the little sister he had found in Pidge, or the unlikely mentor he had found in Allura, until they had all but adopted him into their pieced-together family.  

“Hey, I know what will cheer you up!” Pidge said brightly. “I think I’ve developed the perfect recipe for shaving cream!”

Shiro peeked out from behind his fingers. “Consistency?”

Pidge gave a thumbs up. “Sublime.”

“Parabens?” He asked, suspicion narrowing his brows.  

“I would _never._ ” Pidge crossed her heart.

Shiro bit back a grin. “Tested on men?”

Pidge rolled her eyes. “You know Matt can’t grow a beard to save his life, us Holt’s are doomed to baby soft skin. But,” she bent over to retrieve her bag from under her chair. “I brought you a tub to try out at home. You know.” Her eyes twinkled mischievously. “On your manly, manly beard.”

Shiro snorted, but took the container, popping the corner and taking a sniff. “Mmm,” he nodded. “Verbena?”

“And a bit of vanilla,” Pidge grinned. “Your chin will smell like cupcakes and your violet-eyed future husband will probably try to eat your face.”

Shiro sighed happily. “In my dreams.”

…

The future Mr. Shirogane didn’t return that week. Or the next.

Or the next.

Shiro went through all five stages of grief (and two tubs of Pidge’s shaving cream, which really _was_ sublime) before accepting his fate as a lonely old spinster man, who puttered around in his greenhouse until he was old and grey and lived with five cats.

Well, four cats. But seeing as he was stopping by the shelter to drop off a new supply of organic catnip, it was bound to be five before the day was done.

He couldn’t resist the pissy ones, or the senior citizens, the cats no one else wanted. And he had room at the farm, and besides. There was nothing wrong with having five cats, no matter _what_ Allura said.

“Hey Hunk, I bring gifts of the feline nature!” Shiro set a recycled box of catnip-filled clay pots on the counter and waited for his friend to appear. Hunk was a gentle giant, as good with animals as Shiro was with plants, and they had bonded long ago over a shared love of vintage anime.

Shiro almost upended the entire box when the door to the back slammed open and a panic-stricken stranger appeared.

And not just any stranger--a stranger with violet eyes.

“Oh thank _God,_ you have to help me!” The man said, grabbing Shiro’s hand and dragging him through the door. “They’re crazy, and tiny and I lost at least one--maybe ten--and Hunk is going to _kill_ me!” He was babbling, distraught, which was a blessing in disguise because it gave Shiro something to focus on besides _Oh my God I found him!_

“Okay, okay,” Shiro said, squeezing his fingers and following him into what Hunk lovingly called the Cat Room. “Now, what’s wrong?”

“Them!” The man scowled, pointing at an open box of kittens in the center of the room. “They’re monsters!”

Shiro bit his lip to keep his grin at bay. One tiny orange paw batted at something invisible and gave a sweet _mew._ “Monsters.”

The man crossed his arms, turning his glare on Shiro. “Yes.” He huffed after a beat and pointed at the other cages. “There were _six._ I swear to God there were six, and now there are five and I’ve looked fucking everywhere and every other cat in this hell hole is screaming and hissing and Jesus Christ!” He dug his fingers into the complete and utter destruction that was his hair. “Help. Me.”

Shiro’s hands were gentle when he clasped the man’s wrists, bringing them down between their bodies. “Okay,” he soothed. “I’ll help you find them.” He squeezed once, then forced himself to release him. _Let go or you’re never letting go._ He glanced around the room. The cats in the cages had settled down, watching Shiro with interest. He was a regular visitor to the shelter, so at least some of them probably recognized him. He nodded to the open box. “Let’s count heads, first.” He couldn’t resist meeting those pretty eyes with a grin. “I’m Shiro, by the way.”

The man winced, clearly fighting the urge to escape. “Keith.”

_Houston we have a name!_

“Keith,” Shiro said with much more calm than his wildly beating heart would suggest. He stepped around Keith to kneel beside the box. “You’re sure there were six.” His first glance confirmed five furry little heads: one white, one calico, one orange, and two blue-greys.

Keith nudged up one box flap that read _SIX KITTENS SORRY._

“Okay,” Shiro murmured again, reaching over to squeeze Keith’s arm. It wasn’t really necessary--except it _was--_ but Keith didn’t seem to mind and it prevented Shiro from bending him backward in an old fashioned dip and kissing him silly. _Maybe later._

“Hunk is going to kill me,” Keith muttered forlornly.

“Nah,” Shiro smiled. “Hunk’s nonviolent. And besides. We’re going to find your little stowaway.” His eyes traveled around the room; there were very few hiding spots, even for a tiny blip of fur like these kittens. The cat room was mostly cages, where the cats slept and awaited their all clear from the vets to fraternize, with a side room of playthings and scratching posts and cat towers.

Together, Shiro and Keith methodically checked each cage, and every tower, although the kittens seemed determined to intervene, escaping their box with practiced ease and tangling underfoot, until Shiro held one in each hand, with a third curled on his shoulder and a fourth clinging desperately to his denim-clad thigh. It’s needly claws were just this shy of painful, so he ignored it, laughing when the little guy hissed at Keith as he tried to extract him.

“Jesus, okay,” Keith complained, scooping up the one remaining kitten and holding him at arms-length.

“You could try snuggling it,” Shiro murmured, tongue in cheek. “They like to be next to your neck. Maybe it’s the warmth of skin?”

“Are you crazy?” Keith asked with a frown. “I’m not letting this thing anywhere near my jugular.” But he relented as they circled the room and Shiro couldn’t stop the rush of warm fondness when he glanced over to find Keith stroking the tiny kitten’s back, its sleeping face tucked snug under his chin.

“Don’t say a word,” Keith muttered, although his scowl wasn’t nearly as ferocious as it had been before.

Shiro made a lock and key motion over his mouth with a grin. He deposited his own sleeping babies in their towel-lined box (except for needly-paws, who refused to be put down, his disapproving screech enough to wake the dead). He surveyed the room, perplexed. “And you didn’t go anywhere else?”   

“No,” Keith moaned, squeezing his eyes closed, only to have them pop open a second later. “Wait! Yes! I fed them.”

Shiro chuckled when they unrolled an industrial size bag of cat food, and discovered a ball of orange fluff purring like a freight train inside.

“You little--” Keith growled, but his hands were gentle as he lifted the kitten to his chest.

Shiro wondered if it was too soon to do the swoopy back bending kiss thing.

“So,” he said, and found he didn’t have a single thing to add.

Keith rolled his eyes. “I know, I’m a terrible babysitter. You can say it.”

“What?” Shiro asked, surprised. “No! I was thinking you looked good.” His mouth slammed shut, and heat flooded his face. “I mean--” _Smooth Shiro!_

“What?” Keith laughed. “Are you nuts?”

“Maybe,” Shiro said in earnest. _Crazy in love.._

“I smell like cat puke and I’m covered in a dozen types of hair!”

Shiro shrugged. “I smell like organic fertilizer--ie shit--and I’m also covered in hair.” He twisted his lips in consideration for a beat. _What the hell_. “Do you want to get dinner?”

Keith blinked. “Are you asking me on a date?”

“Yes.” Shiro wondered if Keith knew CPR; he was probably having a heart attack.

Keith studied him, patting the kitten under his chin when it sneezed. “I might be adopting a cat,” he warned.

Shiro glanced down at the kittens asleep in his arms. “I might be adopting two.”

Keith grinned and a dimple popped in his right cheek. The sheer adorableness of it took at least three years off Shiro’s life expectancy.

“How do you feel about Chinese takeout?” Keith asked. “I don’t want to leave him alone in my apartment on his first night.”

Shiro felt the universe expanding for him, just this once. “I feel amazing about it,” he said with the smallest sigh of contentment. “How do you feel about old pickup trucks and organic farming? And goats?”

Keith side eyed him as they locked up the cat room. “I feel awesome about the truck and the farm. Ambivalent about the goats.”

Shiro watched him leave a note for Hunk, promising that he and Shiro would be back tomorrow to formally adopt their kittens. “They grow on you,” he said quietly.

“Who?” Keith asked, handing Shiro a ball of orange fur while he shrugged into his leather jacket.

“The goats.” Shiro passed him the kitten with a grin. “I wasn’t wrong about the cats.”

Keith cocked his head, studying him again. “You’re right, you weren’t.” He sighed, and Shiro would have taken it as resignation except for the smile that lit up his handsome face. “Okay, show me the goats.”

…

_Two hours later_

Keith and the kittens loved the catnip in the greenhouse.

They were still ambivalent about the goats.

But Shiro had Keith’s number and a half a dozen kisses, so he counted it as a win.

_..._

_Two Weeks Later_

With a little maneuvering, Keith and Shiro both fit in the old-fashioned clawfoot tub in the farmhouse.

(Kittens not allowed.)

Shiro was _very_ thankful for bath bombs.

Also, glitter.

  
_fin._


End file.
